United States President Donald Trump has blamed immigration for the violent unrest sweeping France, warning that Paris could eventually become a "Muslim city" and urging French President Emmanuel Macron to tighten border controls.
Speaking to reporters at the White House on Monday, Trump said he had previously warned Macron against allowing people from around the world to enter France without stricter controls. He claimed he had urged the French president to close the country's borders but that Macron had failed to act on his advice.
"France is burning!" Trump wrote on Truth Social, accusing immigrants of contributing to the country's decline and urging French authorities to "close your borders and take control, before it is too late!"
"Overrun with people that don't like your way of life"
Trump argued that immigration, rather than concerns about schools or other public services, was responsible for the unrest in France. He said the country was being "overrun with people that don't like your way of life, and hate France."
The president also called on European countries to strengthen border controls, warning that they could face serious consequences if immigration policies remained unchanged.
Trump returned to the theme at a campaign rally in Michigan on Sunday, where he told the crowd that what Europe is experiencing "is really a mess" and "it's all because they allowed people that hate them into their countries. They don't like their buildings, they don't like their art, they don't like their people, they don't like their laws, and that's what you're seeing on the streets right now."
What the protests are actually about
The protests in France began weeks ago with students demanding better conditions in schools, and they have since been joined by workers and families angry about the cost of living, fuel prices and deteriorating public services.
On Saturday, a second straight weekend of mass protests ended in clashes, fires and mass arrests. French police detained 1,314 people nationwide, according to the final count from the Interior Ministry, and 53 officers were injured. The government estimated about 410,000 people marched across the country; union organizers put the turnout close to double that figure.
French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu condemned the destruction, attributing the violence to the "ultra-left" and criminals. Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez blamed the violence on the "radical extreme left, the ultra-left". Neither the French government nor the available reporting has established immigration as a cause of the protests — and most of the people arrested in the unrest were French citizens.
French President Emmanuel Macron denounced the foreign commentary on the protests, calling some of it "as unacceptable as it is stupid."
The Norway outburst
At the same Michigan rally, Trump also singled out Norway in unusually blunt terms after the Nobel committee, based in Oslo, did not award him the Nobel Peace Prize. Reuters reported that Trump told the crowd: "because I didn't get the Nobel Prize... So I don't want anybody from Norway."
"The Nobel peace prize has been forever discredited by a handful of radical ideologues who are anti-democracy and really enemies of civilisation. And we will not forget, Norway," Trump said, according to The Times.
The rally came a week before the midterm elections, with immigration as a central theme of the campaign. In Michigan, Trump also campaigned against Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, who would become the first Muslim United States senator if elected, calling him a "jihadist Muslim Brotherhood member" — a claim El-Sayed's supporters, including former President Barack Obama and Senator Bernie Sanders, have rejected.
A familiar pattern
Trump has repeatedly used unrest abroad to argue for tougher immigration policies at home. At the Michigan rally he compared the situation in France with the migration crisis in the Spanish city of Ceuta, where tens of thousands of people crossed from Morocco in late July, and said: "Look at what they are doing to Europe. Look at Spain."
"The people who are causing the problems are people who hate Spain and hate France and hate Italy," Trump said, recalling that when he met Macron he told him: "You are destroying France. You are letting in people who hate your country."
The remarks added to an international debate over immigration, border security and social integration in Europe — while in France, the demonstrations themselves continue to be driven by schools, pensions, housing and the cost of living.
Sources: The Times, 26 Oct 2026; Human Rights News Worldwide (AFP), 26 Oct 2026; El Constitucional, 26 Oct 2026; US News Pulse 24 (Reuters), 26 Oct 2026; Le Monde, 26 Oct 2026.